The 2022 Fluffies: our take on the best in branding
In business, any year is typically broken into four parts that form the rhythm of your life. From the plans of Q1 to the verdict of Q4 you push to deliver the now and create the future. This is the long and short of business life in a nutshell. Covid was an exception to this, when long-term plans were shelved to manage the right here right now reality. The problem always with a narrower focus is it leaves you open to the long-term consequences of the giant set wave lurking out the back. Our wave is going to be the double problem of high inflation and low growth, or what the Japanese and British call their new reality. There are real-world consequences when you must raise the price of money after you have already amplified the quantity of money.
In the short-term printing money keeps everyone sweet but in the long term the result is not just inflationary, it is incendiary to an economy that was already running white-hot due to the resilience of our lucky country formula. You make it, we dig it. You want a place to live, we carve out the land, and if you want a future we will sell you the uni place with the added benefits of skilled migration. Add in a small man with a big military settling old-school ground scores and you have what my granddad called a shit sandwich. One serve of unknown wrapped up in two slices of something we really should have all seen coming.
The glass is always half full
While most have been putting out the fires in the present there have been some who have been busy building the future while no one was looking. The Fluffies is our celebration of that. It is a bit tongue and cheek, but firmly our take on what brands and brand ideas are building the future. None of it is ours. Some work has won lots of awards and some have yet to be entered, we suspect, and some are a bit off the radar. Hence the name the Fluffies because there is subjectivity and bias in the below (also because I named it after my daughter’s beloved and now deceased goldfish who spent his time looking out into the world through a glass bowl). We have three categories: 1) Best new brand construct positioning work, 2) Best brand positioning and 3) Best use of distinctive assets.
1. Best new brand construct: narrative-based brands
The emergence of narrative-based brands is a blend of the doctrines of Aaker and Sharp. Signature stories meets distinctive assets who live happily ever after. Rather than try and nail down every possible twist and turn in a static brand construct, brands are developing ‘Once upon a time’ origin and belief stories matched with coded shapes and colours, which puts the brand into most cultural narratives. It should be noted that this is a bit like what KFC did when they ran out of chicken. Your mileage may vary depending on how hungry people are for dirty bird.
The reason this is important is brand salience. In the age of digital discovery where 82% of investigations for new products and services start screen in hand directed by consumers rather than projected in a medium chosen by the brand, it pays to put your brand into the process of 'followship' through narratives that fit the context. In the world of long-tail economies where the big take the majority of the spend in any category, the consumer is spoiled for choice at the fringes. Brands from Mollusk, Liberty Media (owners of F1), Supreme and Merit have taken clear beliefs but tailored them to the be in the moment of discovery they find themselves in via narrative.
The Fluffy goes to:
The North Face: The world’s leading premium exploration brand delivers its positioning to 620 new followers per day through a brand that meets the consumer where they are found and through different narratives that focuses on the joy, daring and grind of exploring our world.
HONOURABLE MENTIONS:
ALDI: Good different takes on many forms, from overcoming objections to the shopping experience to providing buzz-worthy products that are Insta-famous.
Land Rover: The digital-first reveal of the new Defender showcased both the historic utilitarian narrative of the Defender and how it has been reimagined for the digital generation where no Wifi is equivalent to no diff lock.
2. Best brand positioning
As we saw in our last version of these awards, legacy brands are suffering from a paradox of success where their existing brand salience stands in the way of building more relevant brand substance. Many have turned to brand purpose to add emerging societal ‘care abouts’ inside existing brand positioning. This never works as the added care about was never core. Brands that are succeeding today are those who understand where culture is going and how the value it provides to brands is shifting.
In the old era of ‘The Big Idea’, this meant having a point of view on a human ideal whereas today brands have to demonstrate the values they hold are innate and acted upon in their business model. What great brands are doing is focusing on how they deliver their positioning through an intertwined operational model, combining technology and communication to deliver outcomes that are progressive and profitable. Where a post child labour scandal Nike once forged the path between purpose and practicality others are now following.
The Fluffy goes to:
Colruyt Group: Belgium’s leading retailer has put creating surplus value for society at the heart of their model to deliver better outcomes for people and planet through driving sustainable entrepreneurship through their formats and brands.
HONOURABLE MENTIONS:
NRMA: Rather than act as an observer NRMA is preventing problems before they become claims from more fire-safe houses to more roadside rest stops.
Modi Bodi: Award-winning reusable period care. All free from male product developers, other toxins, and single-use plastic and delivered either via shipping or store.
3. Best distinctive assets
False attribution is the plague of any brand. It opens the door for copies and competitors. There are many jobs to be done for brand owners these days but job number 1 is still to be distinctively identified as you.
We already see evolution in the visual Identity systems of the world’s biggest brands from Google to Coke to Cadbury where the individuality of Coke Zero has been resolved with systemic Coke No Sugar. This is not news. The biggest shift? The move from a focus solely on visual brand assets to also embracing a distinctive brand voice. These brand voices are becoming more and more linked to brand action. Different from its confused cousin brand purpose, brand voice is about having an opinion (delivered playfully or forcibly) on what is right and wrong in the world.
The Fluffy goes to:
Oatly: Scandos favourite milk made by humans for humans, Oatly embraces tone of voice to create a distinctive brand in a sea of alt milk sameness.
HONOURABLE MENTIONS:
United States of Soda: Premium soda delivered with a novel twist. They break the subcategory norms of minimalism with language grounded in maximalism. In flavour we trust.
Ikea: Delivering social commentary on everything from elections to changing social fabric through product links with your tongue firmly placed in your cheek.
If you have any other Fluffies or even Furphies you would like to share, please send us a note using the link below.
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Be better to each other.
